The Price of Perfection
by Miss Southern Belle
Summary: The musings of a bride before and after she makes her first walk down the isle.
1. The Price of Perfection

This is my first time writing fanfiction in several years. This is a short drabble that came from listening to a particularly angsty song on a very stormy day. I hope you enjoy.

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To say that it was breezy was an understatement

To say that it was breezy was an understatement. I'd never heard the wind howl so viciously before. The sky was a turning a nasty purple-gray, like the color of a bad bruise. I couldn't help but look down at my arm. It was a perfect pale shade of cream. The skin was smooth and perfectly toned, like the arms of the statues of the Greek goddesses. That was exactly what I had been turned into, a statue; perfect, beautiful and cold. Unlike the statues of the Venus, Athena, and Nike I would not be changed by time, no matter how many years passed I would always be the same, a perfect cold hard statue.

The wind howled around me again, shaking trees and sending branches and leaves flying. This was a furious storm, a perfect example of pathetic fallacy. It howled like a pack of angry wolves, starved and prepared to fend off the remnants of a carcass that had been found in the winter snow. If my heart had the capability to beat it would be furiously pumping blood through my veins as my ferocity grew, empowered by the unforgiving winds.

Above me the purple sky swirled and twisted in on itself, making it even darker. I looked down at my arm again and it wasn't hard to imagine the bruises that had covered a must for delicate and warmer version of myself; bruises the same color of the sky. Purple bruises and streams of crimson blood had mixed together on every surface of my body successfully defiling every perfection of my human life; a life that I would never be able to get back, not even with the countless number of lifetimes that had been granted to me.

Cold rain was slashing its way through the atmosphere, cutting into everything below like a thousand small knives. I could feel the wicked grin on my lips; the setting simply couldn't be more perfect. Now if only there was an orchestra to serenade these final moments. Something slow and deep, the kind of music that reaches inside you and makes your heart beat with it. This needed something both elegant and brutal, just the right amount of controlled chaos.

Finally thunder shook the skies and I began my march. This was what I had been waiting for, the signal to my entrance. Obviously whatever gods existed above this sick and twisted world consented with my plan because the thunder continue to rumble in the murky sky and my march continued.

I clutched the small bouquet of forget-me-nots and roses tighter, not wanting them to fly off. What was a bride to do without her bouquet? It simply wouldn't be proper. My eyes narrowed and only my concrete plans kept me from loosing my mind. I wanted to break out of this skin and unleash the full force of my fury onto what had once been my perfect world. I wanted to rip down all of the masks that had been placed so carefully and expose the dark truths that lay beyond every which picked fence.

But that wouldn't have the same effect as this. No, this was going to be sweet and victorious revenge against those who knew exactly what those dark truths were. I wanted to hear them scream, to hear them beg for the life that I would never have back. I needed to hear their pleading so I could know how it felt to ignore someone begging for mercy. I needed to know what it was like to get away with murder.

I caught the reflection of myself in a dark store window. As always, I looked beautiful, even in the storm the veil and dress were holding up perfectly. The white stood out so sharply against the darkness of the night. My gilded hair was curled into loose ringlets beneath the lace of my veil. Of course now that it was raining the long train was stained as were my shoes but even still I looked absolutely perfect.

Another wicked grin spread across my blood red lips. It was time they learned the price of perfection.

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Disclaimer: Rosalie Hale (c) Stephenie Meyer


	2. The Rewards

I was finally able to think of a way to tie off this short little story. I'm really quite happy with how this turned out. I love it when things like this just strike you out of no where.

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Music. Laughter. Dancing. And only the smallest amount of drama.

It had been quite a successful wedding.

Of course there was no doubt that it wouldn't be. With Rosalie, Alice, and Esme Cullen behind the planning the ceremony was certain to be the most beautiful and outlandish wedding that the small town of Forks had ever seen. The only thing that Rosalie had worried about was the bride. Bella was never predictable, not even for Alice, and Mrs. Hale would be lying if she said she hadn't thought that, even for the briefest second, that Bella might likely jump out of the second story window to escape the wedding.

Thankfully she hadn't (Rosalie suspected that Alice had made Jasper work overtime on Bella's nerves) and everything had gone exactly as planned. At least, it had until that damn wolf showed up. It made Bella happy but of course he nearly ruined the entire night, stupid mutt. She couldn't wait for them to be able to move so they would be away from those rancid, flea bitten creatures. Rosalie had always hated dogs.

But, that was hours ago. Edward and Bella were on their way to Esme's island for their honeymoon and the Cullens were almost finished cleaning up their house. All of the humans were gone and they could relax. But, in the wake of the joining of her brother and his bride, Rosalie couldn't suppress the memories of her wedding. Sadly these memories were not of walking down the isle to her beloved Emmett, but the first time she'd ever put on a wedding dress.

That night was still fresh in her mind, always lurking in the dark corners that she tried so hard to avoid. The wind had blown so hard and the dark, oppressive clouds had sealed the town in an early night; that had been one of the worst storms in history. At the time it was perfect, but seeing it replayed over and over again had made the setting loose its dark perfection and instead made the memory so much harder to relive. She'd come to think of the storm as the last bit of humanity that she would ever face and the rain as the tears that she would never be able to shed again.

Rosalie didn't regret what she had done that night, she never would. Killing those men had given her the temporary closure that she needed to move on, to continue with her new life. If she hadn't then she would probably be like those newborns that they had fought off just months before, crazed and bent on human destruction. She probably would have met the same end too, at the hands of the Volturi.

Then she would have never found Emmett, laying there so frailly, nothing more than a rag doll under the paws of that bear. It was so odd to think of Emmett as anything other than strong, but she had seen him then, in his final moments as a mortal. Sometimes she still hated herself for making the choice for him but, as he told her time and time again; if she hadn't then he would have never met his angel.

His angel, the term of endearment made her eyes prick as her body tried to release tears that it could no longer make. The first time he'd told her the way it looked from his eyes she'd been shocked. Ever since she had been turned she hadn't been able to see herself as anything but a monster, and yet here was this man who months before had been breathing and had a beating heart, calling her his angel. Obviously he was insane because a few years later they were married for the first time.

That wedding was her favorite. It was small and simple, just a few people to witness as Carlisle walked her down the isle and the priest had sealed their vows, binding her to the man she loved for all eternity. They still snickered at the "till death do you part" line.

Yes, Emmett was her one true love, her soul mate, her other half. Whenever God had formed her in heaven, he designed Emmett to be right beside her. And it wasn't just them; Esme and Carlisle, Alice and Jasper, even Bella and Edward, all of them were two parts of a whole. Even after death they found each other and made a way for them to survive together and that was how their family had come together, out of love and pure longing to be with their soul mates.

Compared to the price of perfection, the lives that had to be given up and forgotten, the innocent people who had to die for the sake of survival, the rewards were greater. When Carlisle had made the choice for her, when he'd given her this immortal life, he'd also given her a chance to be part of a family who loved her for who she was, and had given her a chance to fall in love over and over and over again.

"Rose?" Emmett called as he pushed open the door to their bedroom. He was still in his suit, his tie untied and hanging around his neck. She wouldn't have been surprised if it had been wrapped around his head.

"There you are. I didn't know where you'd hidden yourself." He grinned as he walked over and sat down on the bed beside her. Automatically their hands found each other and intertwined.

"Well, its over, Bella is officially part of the family and Edward can stop moping and being emo." Emmett huffed out.

Rosalie laughed. "Oh just because they are married doesn't mean that Edward is going to stop moping; he still has to turn her. Maybe when he can hold her and kiss her without holding back he'll finally calm down."

"You mean once he can knock down a few houses with her, right babe?" Emmett teased as he planted a light kiss on her cheek.

She laughed again. "I do hope they don't knock down the beach house. Esme is in love with it, she'll be devastated if they do."

"But at least Bella and Edward will both be smiling at the same time."

The couple laughed, their hands squeezing each other, silently relaying the simple words "I love you" over and over again. Yes, being able to be in love with someone for all eternity was definitely worth dying for.

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The Cullens (c) Stephenie Meyer


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